Nine Provinces Tiara

Queen Mathilde of Belgium will be celebrating her 50th Birthday tomorrow! With one of the smallest jewellery collections among her European counterparts, Queen Mathilde is frequently seen in just a few limited pieces, so today, we are ending our series on her jewels by covering the spectacular Nine Provinces Tiara!

When Princess Astrid of Sweden married Crown Prince Leopold of Belgium in 1926, the Belgian Government gave a spectacular gift to their new Crown Princess: an Art Deco Tiara of a meander base topped with eleven big round diamonds that represented the nine Belgian Provinces, the then Belgian Colony of Congo, and the Belgian Royal House, with the Tiara created by Van Bever in Antwerp using Diamonds from Congo. Further detachable diamond arches were added to the top of the Tiara in 1934. The piece could be worn just as a bandeau without the top diamonds or the arches, which could be affixed onto a necklace, while the meander base can also be worn as a choker or a bracelet.

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Crown Princess Astrid first wore her new Nine Provinces Tiara for the Bal de la Grande Harmonie in 1927, and it was also worn for a series of portraits in its various configurations. Another notable appearance came at the Wedding of Crown Prince Umberto of Italy and her sister-in-law, Princess Marie Jose of Belgium, in 1930.

The additional diamond arches were added shortly before the accession of King Leopold III, and Queen Astrid wore the Nine Provinces Tiara for a series of iconic official portraits taken soon afterwards, and also for the Wedding Gala of Crown Prince Frederik of Denmark and Princess Ingrid of Sweden at the Royal Palace of Stockholm in 1935, just a few months before her tragic death in a car accident.

After Queen Astrid’s tragic death, the Nine Provinces Tiara was worn in various forms by King Leopold III’s second wife, the Princess de Réthy, though never in the full version. The Princess wore the Bandeau, wore the piece as a bracelet, and also added the Diamonds to Queen Elisabeth’s Diamond Bandeau for a Banquet at the American Embassy in Brussels in 1958, while sometimes suspending the diamonds from a gold choker.

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When, Doña Fabiola de Mora y Aragón married King Baudouin of Belgium in 1960, the Nine Provinces Tiara was the main heirloom jewel passed on to her, worn for the first time on her Wedding Day. That cemented the Tiara’s role of being worn solely by the Belgian Queen, passed on rather than held privately.

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In the first years after her marriage, Queen Fabiola alternated the Nine Provinces Tiara with her Spanish Wedding Gift Tiara, and it was worn for the Diplomatic Reception at the Royal Palace of Brussels in 1961, the Belgian State Visit to the Vatican, the State Visit to Britain in 1963, the British State Visit to Belgium in 1966, the Belgian State Visit to Denmark in 1966, the Luxembourg State Visit to Belgium in 1967, and the Danish State Visit to Belgium in 1968.

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In the 1970s, Queen Fabiola preferred to wear the Nine Provinces Tiara without the nine large diamonds in the arches, which is how it was worn for the Japanese State Visit to Belgium and the French State Visit to Belgium in 1971, and while she once though it does not seem to have been worn through the 1980s nor the early 1990s, up until the passing of King Baudouin of Belgium in 1993, when the Tiara was passed on to Queen Paola.

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1999: Luxembourgish state visit to Belgium.
From left: Grand Duchess Joséphine-Charlotte of Luxembourg (born Princess of Belgium), her brother King Albert II of the Belgians, Queen Paola of the Belgians and Grand Duke Jean of Luxembourg.
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© Anouk Antony pic.twitter.com/L9KA7Op66V
— RoyalArjan (@RoyalArjan) October 26, 2018

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Queen Paola had only worn Queen Elisabeth’s Diamond Bandeau for the past three decades, and reserved the Nine Provinces Tiara for the most formal events, usually State Visits to and from other Monarchies, like the Belgian State Visit to Luxembourg in 1994 and the State Visit to Spain in 1994, as well as the State Visit to Denmark in 1995, the State Visit to Japan in 1996, the Luxembourg State Banquet at the Royal Palace of Brussels in 1999, the Danish State Visit to Belgium in 2002, and the Dutch State Visit to Belgium in 2006. Queen Paola also wore the Bandeau as a choker for the Wedding of Crown Prince Frederik of Denmark in 2004.

After the Accession of King Philippe as the King of The Belgians, the Nine Provinces Tiara was passed on to Queen Mathilde, who first wore the Bandeau Base for her first Official Portrait in 2013, which was the same version worn for a Chinese State Visit the following year, the Wedding of Prince Carl Philip of Sweden in 2015, and the Jordanian State Visit to Belgium.

In 2015, Queen Mathilde wore the full version of the Nine Provinces Tiara for the first time at Queen Margrethe’s 75th Birthday Banquet, after which it was worn for the Belgian State Visit to the Netherlands and the Belgian State Visit to Denmark as well as a new Official Portrait.

More recently, Queen Mathilde wore the Meander Bandeau for the French State Visit to Belgium, and full version of the Tiara for the the Belgian State Visit to Luxembourg, before wearing just the bandeau version for Emperor Naruhito’s Enthronement Banquet a week later. There is no doubt we will continue to see this splendid Jewel for years to come!